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Posted February 2, 2014 12:32 am - Updated February 2, 2014 12:33 am

Mark Woods: Super memories and a super future

We were talking about the Super Bowl the other day. Not the matchup of the Seahawks and Broncos. When your 12-year-old daughter is at LaVilla School of the Arts, you compare halftime shows. And Mia said she thinks this one, featuring Bruno Mars, will be better than one a couple of years ago with "that old lady."

"What old lady?" I said.

"You know, the one with the blonde hair," she said. "What's her name? Madonna?"

"Madonna?" I repeated.

I started to say that Madonna isn't old, that I remember when she first sang "Lucky Star" and that if Madonna is old, it means that I'm ... never mind.

Time flies. Believe it or not, it has been nine years since Jacksonville played host to a Super Bowl. Remember sportswriters complaining about OUR weather? (How's New Jersey these days?) Remember the Patriots beating the Eagles, Paul McCartney singing "Hey Jude" and Jacksonville leaders saying this was going to be the start of a new era for the city's downtown?

This means that a year from now, when we hit the 10th anniversary of Super Bowl XXXIX, we inevitably will be analyzing what has and hasn't happened since.

Whenever we go through this exercise, we typically tend to gripe about how our downtown still has some of the same issues it has had for decades. To a degree, this certainly is true. But I'm optimistic about what is around the corner.

And not because Toney Sleiman recently unveiled grand plans for tearing down The Landing and starting over. Or because an investment company has been pitching the idea of building a 1,000-foot tall observation tower as part of a development at The Shipyards.

We've been to these rodeos before. It's one thing to have blueprints and press conferences. It's another to have greenbacks and grand openings.

And while this coming year will include some encouraging things happening in the middle of downtown — perhaps most notably One Spark's second festival in April — what gives me optimism isn't what's happening in the heart of downtown. It's what's happening nearby, in its arteries.

Two parks. One new, one old. One part of a development in Riverside, the other part of a restoration project in Springfield and the Eastside.

Start with the development, 220 Riverside. It is expected to open this fall with apartments, retail space and Unity Plaza — a public gathering space that isn't just an addendum to the project, but is the defining feature of it.

Add in all that is going on around 220 Riverside — another residential/retail project, the continuation of the Riverside Arts Market, the construction of a new YMCA — and there's reason to believe this area on the edge of downtown will be dramatically different by the 10th anniversary of our Super Bowl.

From there, let's head to the other side of downtown. Start on the Riverwalk. Remember when the city held a ribbon-cutting shortly before the Super Bowl to open this 1.5-mile stretch of the walk? And how that affected much more than those 1.5 miles?

We'll pass The Landing and The Shipyards, two places perpetually in the middle of the news and battles and plans.

We'll continue until we get to Hogans Creek and the "emerald necklace" that winds from Springfield to the St. Johns River, the greenspace that not only could be our version of a Central Park — but once upon a time was.

In 1914 — 100 years ago this May — more than 48,000 old Confederate soldiers gathered for a reunion, an event that led one of the parks to be renamed Confederate Park. And in the 1920s, famed architect Henry Klutho designed a beautification project that included six bridges, three footbridges, decorative balustrades, lights and 10,000 square yards of sidewalks.

In the decades since, Hogans Creek has gone from the "Grand Canale" to a not-so-grand, neglected, contaminated piece of the downtown puzzle.

But now there is reason to believe this will change.

Last fall, Groundwork USA, a national nonprofit that strives to rejuvenate polluted waterways and abandoned parks, picked Jacksonville as one of its latest sites.

This wasn't the kind of news that involved talk of millions of dollars (or, in the case of the Shipyards plan, a billion). The National Park Service, a partner in the Groundwork program, pledged to chip in $80,000 for the start-up phase of Groundwork Jacksonville. And the city committed $50,000 a year, for three years.

Groundwork Trusts — local, independent nonprofits — already have made a difference in 19 cities. Beyond that, in the big picture, this is the kind of change the park service envisions fostering as it prepares to celebrate its centennial in 2016 and head into the future. Not just bringing people to the parks. Bringing parks to the people.

In 2012, a division devoted to such efforts — the NPS Rivers, Trails and Conservation Association program — helped local partners develop 2,154 miles of trails, conserve 1,074 miles of rivers and protect 70,385 acres of parkland.

I recently talked to Steve Golden, a Boston-based park service employee who has been involved with rivers and trails programs for decades. I contacted him about an event in Arizona. But knowing that I was from Jacksonville, he started by talking about visiting last spring and touring the potential Groundwork site with city officials.

"We're excited about what's happening there," he said.

So are some of us here.

This change isn't going to happen overnight, or by the 10th anniversary of our Super Bowl. But maybe by the time middle schoolers consider Bruno Mars, now 28, an old man and Lady Gaga — who is mentioned as a potential future halftime performer — an old lady. Which probably is sooner than I think.

Mark Woods is on a sabbatical this year to write a book. He can be reached at tumarkwoods@gmail.com.